Think big

"Make no little plans,” wrote 19th-century architect Daniel Burnham. “They have no magic to stir humanity’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized.”

Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. Remember that our sons and daughters are going to do things that will stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon, beauty. Think big.

This statement was much more than rhetoric. It embodied Burnham’s commitment to the design of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, the Flatiron building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C. Burnham thought big, and he put his thoughts and dreams into action.